0-10V Dimming

[warric48]

We are planning to fit some floor-mounted LED lights, with a (Collingwood) driver that is dimmable with a 0-10V signal. Is there some sort of adaptor I can use to control these lights from a standard dimmer switch?
Thanks for any help,
Richard

 

[toasty]

Hi!


I'm in bristol too.

See what I did with my 0-10v dimmers here... www.yourmissus.com/lighting

Basically a variable resistor with 10v across it and then use the wiper (middle connection) to provide the 0-10v output.

I made mine with blanking plates and variable resistors from maplin.

Dan

 

[toasty]

..oh and ignore all the DMX and computer stuff.

I can control my dimmers both ways, but the 0-10v I used is very applicable to you.

Hope this helps
Dan

 

[Steve]

..oh and ignore all the DMX and computer stuff.

I was gonna say!! Bit in-depth that stuff! Even I dont get it!

 

[ericmark]

I would be wary of any DIY mix of extra low voltage and low voltage. looking at Dan's set up it looks OK but I have also seem some horrors where the designed had never heard of optical isolators or any other separation method.
Most dimmer switches use a thyristor control which chops the wave form and although in theory you could transform and rectify and smooth the output I would expect spikes would cause problems and really the two do not mix.
I would guess the LED's are not dimmed as such but switched on and off very rapid did some experiments myself with 555 timer and different mark space ratios. And AC ripple may cause all sorts of unexpected results.

 

[SparkyNinja]

..oh and ignore all the DMX and computer stuff.

I didn't catch that bit, my eyes hurt now


Very interesting though.